Babur Khan： Age of Empires 2 – The Dynasties of India
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Summary
In this episode of Age of Empires 2 Let's Play video, we take a look at one of the most brutal conquerors of the Mughals, Babur Khan. He was a brutal conqueror of exceeding ruthlessness, and a man who had a firm belief in his own destiny.
Transcript
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Greetings my esteemed subscribers. Welcome to the greatest gaming channel of all time.
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Now I'm joking, it isn't really. It isn't even a gaming channel but I thought it would be fun to introduce it thus.
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It's Age of Empires 2 and we have a new DLC for the game which is set in good old India.
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And as you can see before you, we have a campaign with good old Babur.
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Now as you have probably seen, I can only suppose that you are following me on different social media, telegram for example and Instagram.
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I recommended a book series a while back, which the first book in the series is about Babur Khan.
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And I actually read this book quite a few years back and then I decided to re-read it.
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And it was much better on the second read through.
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Because as you attain more experience yourself, you get a different appreciation for the ups and downs of life so to speak.
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And you get a different appreciation for someone who, despite everything, pursues his goals and his visions.
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And someone who has a firm belief in his own destiny.
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So for all Indians who might be listening and watching this, I am of course not endorsing the Havok Babur cast in India.
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But you know, history is full of violence, so it's not really something I need to say.
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But I know that there is a bloody history of the Mughals.
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But anyway, the book series is what I want to get to.
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Great series and as you all know, I do write a lot of book reviews.
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Now if you are new to reading, I would definitely recommend you to read some historical fiction.
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So you get a good, easily digested overview of certain time periods.
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So I learned quite a bit from just reading those books about the Mughal Empire.
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Now anyway, this is not actually a video on books.
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So we are going to get straight into good old Babur here.
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So as I am sure they will say in this cinematic we are about to see, Babur Khan claimed to be a descendant of the great Genghis Khan and also of Tamerlane, Timur Lenk.
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You actually have a campaign here in Age of Empires 2 and he was a brutal conqueror of exceeding ruthlessness.
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So anyway, Babur Khan came from a line of bloody conquerors and of course he had grown up with people telling him of his destiny, of his blood.
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That he was divinely blessed to achieve greatness and of course if you have that sort of belief in yourself then reality will conform to that vision.
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Now anyway, enough talking from my side, let's get into the game itself.
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Perhaps they are talking about Samarkand there.
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I fear that I do not have much time left in this world.
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And for all my humility, I believe it has been extraordinary enough to be written about.
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You may accuse me of vanity, but I have decided to write the book myself.
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I dined with fine emirs and caroused with simple peasants on moonlit steps.
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They waged wars and sat on thrones only to lose them again.
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And it all began in the maelstrom of intrigue and bloody skirmishes that was my beloved Transoxiana.
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The melting pot of Persian high culture and nomadic traditions.
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To the East of Samarkand, my father ruled the fertile slopes of the Fergana Valley.
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Like all heirs of Tamerlane, he was a proud Timurid who sought to imitate his great ancestor.
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Unfortunately, Allah had not blessed him with a knack for warfare.
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After a few humiliating defeats, he decided to devote himself to his other passions.
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One day, as my father was climbing the stairs to check on his birds,
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Allah, in his infinite wisdom, decided that this model of gluttony had waffled on the earth for long enough.
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Halfway up to the dovecote, the stairs collapsed under him, and he fell to his death.
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And that is how I, Babur, came to be lord of the Fergana Valley.
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Yet, like all transitions of power in our culture, it was not to be a peaceful one.
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Thanks to my dear mother, Kutluk, my bays agreed not to abandon what surely appeared to be a dynasty in shambles.
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At that time, I was just a 14 year old boy with nothing to my name.
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And my uncles, who had long desired the Fergana Valley, thought that my inheritance was ripe for the taking.
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So anyway, good introduction, as is the case for most of these Age of Empires 2 campaigns.
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Okay, so we have to hold off the enemy Timurids.
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So, Timurids, the etymology is the House of Timur, so Tamerlane.
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So we have some, the fortified tower must not be destroyed, and Babur and his mother Kutluk must survive.
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I'm not going to read through this, because it's not reasonable at this particular time.
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Men sneak around in the shadows of our walls, my princess.
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These cowards snuck up in the dark of the night, but there is no need to fearfully hide.
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Hold our position until dawn, and the sun will reveal the faces of these scoundrels.
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So here we have Kutluk, which is the mother.
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So since we have these heroes, they regenerate health.
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I am merely making sure that he is getting a taste of battle.
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And of course we have to be careful so he doesn't die, Young Babur.
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And of course when you play Age of Empires II, you can try to get the archers to shoot at infantry.
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Now I managed to lose some of my cavalry, unfortunately, but it is what it is.
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And now I actually forgot to do something which I should have done at the very start.
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And that is to upgrade the attack of my archers.
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I can always blame my gaming performance on the fact that I am recording.
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Some of your greedy uncles were among the attackers.
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They are not worthy of ruling, Glorious Summergant.
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And since they failed to seize our homeland, we will now take theirs.
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And we're going to conquer these hostile Timurids.
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So now, what you should always do, if you play any strategy game, I suppose.
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So what I will do now is I will try to get hold of some stone somewhere.
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And boom means that I will create a strong economy.
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That is the first action to do whenever you play.
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Match can be achieved if you trust in Allah and your own strength.
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But it cannot hurt to have loyal allies by your side.
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Seek out other emirs in the area who can be convinced to join our cause.
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I believe it's the only reasonable course of action.
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And now we are going to get rid of the Uzbeks.
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But we are going to see if we can do something here.
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Now they have been successfully tricked into coming to us.
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And of course I don't want to lose young Babur here.
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So he will have to run around a bit when the others are fighting.
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So now we have cleared the path for Kutlug to explore a bit.
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But my people report that the Uzbeks construct siege weapons in a nearby camp.
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I would rather see these powerful devices in your hands than theirs.
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Aha, so these guys, they have told us that we can gain these tribuchets.
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Because it would be too long if I record all of it.
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If you play Age of Vampires 2 or any strategy game for that matter.
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To get your economy in order before focusing on military matters.
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Then of course you should create an army at the same time.
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So that you don't get mogged by enemy raiders and the like.
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I think that is reasonable since we are playing as the Tatars.
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The young tiger with both Tamalene's and Temujin's blood in his veins.
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And we shall form an alliance following our traditional custom.
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Alright, so we have to procure 10 white horses...
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And I see two magnificent white stallions here.
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And he will take good care of you, I am certain.
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And then we have a third Timurid noble to visit.
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But your father is not exactly a religious man.
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We will bring a sacred relic to this fine gentleman.
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But as you can see, we have also been attacked here.
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So now we have to use the infamous, or famous, or depending on your perspective, hit and run tactics.
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They are especially good against cavalry archers.
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And now, of course, we need to repair our tower here.
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And perhaps build a castle there somewhere as well.
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I think that's the only reasonable course of action.
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And you can see the nice Central Asian aesthetics of the buildings here.
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He was very pleased with our offering of ten white horses.
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I'm happy now we can fight alongside us as we try to mog these new males.
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I'm sure these hostile timreeds were not new males.
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I think we were quite concerned indeed with honor and the principles of warrior culture.
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And now, as you can see, we have amassed a decent enough force so we can probably go on a little raid to procure these trebuchets.
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Perhaps that's actually a silent T, if you pronounce it in French.
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So we have here some camels, which are good against cavalry.
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They get a bit anxious when they're near camels.
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And this is reflected in the game by camels being additionally good against the cavalry.
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So we need to train some more camels, I suppose, to get rid of them.
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But, as I mentioned before, you can actually trade.
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But, of course, it's better to mine gold or even trade.
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You can see if we find a friendly market somewhere.
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Tiger, you will easily crush your devious uncles with this trebuchet.
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And there we were exceedingly close to getting Babur killed.
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Perhaps I should actually station him in the castle here so he doesn't...
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So we have to send our cavalry there immediately.
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And now, as you can see, you can also upgrade their armor so they're a bit tougher.
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And we are approaching the great city of Samarkand.
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And we have also finally picked up the relic which we will gift to the pious lord of this fine village.
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And there is the second castle we need to destroy with our fine trebuchets.
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And we have procured a military camp here as well.
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So we can train additional soldiers and send in to the thick.
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Allah must love you greatly if you manage to find this relic and bring it to me.
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My dervishes and I will stand by your side in the coming betters, Babur.
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Skill diplomacy is as good a weapon as a sword.
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So now we have to be on the lookout for pikemen, as I said.
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Otherwise, they will completely mog our cavalry.
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Fortunately, these horse archers have a decent attack against this pikemen.
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So I'm not going to spoil anything about the book, but Samarkand was initially, at least, the grand prize that Babur and, of course, all Timurid princes, they wanted to have it.
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A very rich city, of course, neatly located on the Silk Road.
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Speaking of the Silk Road, or rather, the Silk Roads, I have a book which I have shown and I will get around to read it.
00:24:01.580
I will talk about it in a podcast or a book review or even in a video when I have read it, but my to-read list is...
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Samarkand, Tamerlane's dearest bride, is back in the hands of a true Timurid.
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As delightful as it is to watch these daft-grunt children of Tamerlane slaughter each other, it is getting a little boring.
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It is time to put an end to this juvenile struggle.
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But it is good that the Uzbeks are so haughty.
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Yes, as I was saying, my to-read list is quite extensive, as it is.
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And now, of course, as you saw from the dialogue,
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Shaibani Khan, which is a prominent antagonist in the books as well.
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Shaibani Khan has decided to wage war upon us.
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And yeah, as I was just saying, he appears in the first book as well.
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Now, as you can see here, the enemy Uzbek army, their civilization is the Cumans.
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And the Cumans, a very fascinating story in itself.
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They got driven away during the Mongol conquest of Russia.
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And then they actually got their revenge on the Mongols.
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And you have, in this fine game, Age of Empires 2,
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you have a campaign where you play as the Cumans.
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And, uh, I do believe that victory will be ours.
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The city's merchants and dignitaries were thrilled to receive me
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as they had heard that I did not tolerate looting among my soldiers.
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under the pretext that they might catch a few sheep
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I realized that I had to gamble for my survival.
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and lost the land of my forefathers to the invaders.